A game of chance

It’s an odd feeling to be going resolutely against the tide. This morning I took my usual train to Baker Street but as I descended the stairs toward the Bakerloo line I was aware of far more people than normal coming up the other way. As I reached the bottom an announcement informed me that there were “severe delays on the Bakerloo line due to signal failure”. (It’s always signal failure, unless you get the very rare but always intriguing “passenger action”).
My escape route in this particular case is to take the Jubilee which runs conveniently parallel to the Bakerloo all the way to my destination of Waterloo. So I continued on to the Bakerloo platform from where there is easy access to the Jubilee avoiding the worst of the crowds. There was a train at the platform with a few determined passengers sitting still whilst others continued to detrain. The platform announcer told us that we could board if we wished but we might be in for a long wait. It always pays to keep an eye on the signals and, as I reached the end of the platform where there is a short tunnel to the Jubilee, I saw the light turn green. I boarded the train at once. The announcer also noticed it and opined that though the train might shortly depart, it would be slow and we would be taking a gamble.
I took the gamble (staking possible holdups against the certainty of a jam-packed Jubbly) and stayed put. We left almost at once with the train nearly empty. There was no delay at all and we proceeded at normal speed to Waterloo, the train staying blissfully devoid of crush because everyone was undoubtedly packing into the trains just ahead of us. As I left the station they were still repeating the mantra of “severe delays”. Well, not for this particular commuter there weren’t.

A Danubian interlude

No posts for a few weeks. The first two weeks in September were spent cruising up the Danube from the delta in Romania to Linz in Austria. I have written before about the joys of this means of transport and will not repeat myself. But forget the "blue" Danube - it's a sludgy brownish-grey most of the time (which is not to say the trip was in any way disappointing - it was wonderful).

I am always captivated by the trams of Europe. Bucharest, Budapest, Bratislava and Vienna have wonderful examples. The services are (or at least appear to be) frequent and of course there are few hold ups. Unlike the underground with its clumsy block signalling systems, the trams can make full use of the track, and when necessary, use all the available space (as the platform staff like to say) in the turning circles at the end of each line.

Here's a nice shot from Budapest to whet your appetites.

Meanwhile I learn that the long awaited new train stock for the Metropolitan will be introduced next year. Designed for "easy access" (even though most of the stations are not), there will be fewer seats and lots more standing room. Oh joy. LU does not really understand what it is like to do long distance commuting. My emergency planning embraces some sort of portable seat, like a shooting stick but not with the sharp pointy end, so that there will be a degree of comfort on those when the trains are crowded. With a bit of luck the current round of spending cuts will delay these new trains for a few years, then I can retire and all this heartache will cease.

The Great North Road

To Nottingham, for a family wedding party. Although the direct route is up the M1, we took the A1 going north, so as to detour to a distinctly strange National Trust site at Lytham New Bield, and then back again because I had a little business to transact in Biggleswade.

I love the A1. For much of the way it is as fast as the motorway, and the odd slowdowns and traffic queues at the few major junctions on the way are forgiven by the views and the wayside distractions of the little towns and the old coaching inns by the side of the road. There are fewer Little Chefs than there used to be (no great loss) but the Fox Inn and the Sibson Inn and our favourite, the Ram Jam Inn, continue to lure in the weary traveller who can easily imagine himself taking refreshment in a room that Dick Turpin might have put his muddy boots up in.

The Ram Jam, lurking on a deceptively empty stretch of road near Oakham, used to put up signs on the approach - "1 mile to the Ram Jam Inn" and when you had gone past - "You have just missed the Ram Jam Inn". Like the Little Chefs, the signs are fewer in number though this seems to increase the pleasure of actually spotting the Inn after the long miles up from London. One day we really ought to stop there.

If that was not enough, the Inn is in Rutland, a county so small it has "Welcome to Rutland" written on both sides of the sign*. Like Middlesex, the planners tried to kill it but it refuses to die. It is another element in the romance of the Great North Road.

*Just my little joke, Rutlanders, no need to start slagging me off on Facebook.

The great heatwave of '09

Temperatures in London hit 30c yesterday. Nothing special about that, except that this followed several weeks of dull and cool weather, and today we are back to wind. rain and cloud. So it seems that yesterday will be fondly remembered as the great heatwave of 2009, and children yet unborn will marvel when their grandparents tell them how we endured the awful conditions and the sleepless nights [I think you mean 'night': Ed].

Naturally I chose this night of all nights to be in the sweltering Royal Albert Hall for a Prom.

But I have to hand it to LU - the timetable for the Piccadilly back to beautiful Ruislip said there would be a train leaving South Kensington at 22:21 and there was. And had it not been for the young man with the leaky earphones listening to the inevitable high-pitched thud of "dance" noise [he means music: Ed] all would have been well.

Sneezes and security

After the tube bombings in 2005, we all became suspicious of packages and bags on the tube. For a while. After the first wave of swine flu earlier this year we all eyed with hostility anyone coughing or sneezing. This is wearing off. The atmosphere on the tube seems to be closer to those innocent days of yesteryear. We naturally want to be able to trust our fellow passengers and, though the threats remain, that level of trust always finds a way of rising back up.

It is of course hard to know just what the real threats may be. All risks are a matter of probability, but most people don't understand the nature of probability (which is why so many play the National Lottery). Based on experience, the likelihood of being caught in a terrorist attack is amazingly low, way lower than the chances of being in a car crash or a street fight. But whilst we are still warned about unattended packages, nobody warns us to be careful on the road when leaving the Tube.

As for flu, some people are getting it all the time and swine flu is not the only nasty strain we might encounter. I don't know if I should worry about it or not. The nurse at my local GP tells me they are not particularly bothered about it. I don't know anyone who has had it, or who knows someone who has it. Even if you get it, it is not clear what the probability of it turning into a life-threatening condition may be. So on the whole, best to ignore it for the moment. What with a vital decider coming up in the Ashes series, we have more important things to strain the old adrenaline glands.